In a world where there is an abundance of music on offer online, listening to music is paradoxically concentrated on a smaller number of popular artists. This is one of the observations made by Productions Nuits d'Afrique as part of the study "Valuing diversity artists [...] in the era of digital platforms", carried out by Destiny Tchéhouali. This observation is shared by Zone Franche, which has been warning for many years about the invisibility of World Music in the media and, now, on platforms.
On the one hand, the algorithmic recommendations of listening platforms seem to comfort listeners in their musical tastes, without offering any real musical discoveries. On the other, search engines, even when users make precise queries, struggle to direct users towards niche or diversified content.
In both cases, the user's attention is directed towards a limited number of star products or international content enjoying a certain popularity and visibility, to the detriment of a rich diversity of French-language content.
What's more, this over-representation of certain artists and aesthetics, and the consequent invisibility of others, raises questions about musical openness and cultural diversity, the standardisation of listening habits and aesthetics, and the fair remuneration of artists.
Professionals are taking up these issues, and this round table will discuss the La Percée project (initiated by Les Productions Nuits d'Afrique and co-produced by Zone Franche, the World Music network) and the Fair Music Project, run by the International Music Council, both of which are working to address these problems.
This discussion, which will bring together a researcher, a cultural entrepreneur, an artist representative and an international organisation, will bring together a variety of perspectives on the issues of discoverability and fair music.
The exhibition La Percée - Collective music laboratory will be on view in the FGO-Barbara lobby as a complement to this intervention.
